A study on the effects of Hyrcanian deforestation on greenhouse gases emission in Golestan Province

Forest ecosystems provide a wide range of multiple ecosystem services (ESs) that are important for sustaining life on earth and maintaining the integrity of the ecosystems. One of the most important forest ESs is climate regulation. On one hand, carbon accumulates through growth of trees into forest growing stock. On the other hand, Land use/land cover (LULC) change activities impact carbon stocks. Because of the ongoing Hyrcanian deforestation, we focused on how different LU change affect GHGs emissions in Golestan province based on REDD project. Four carbon pools include above-ground, below-ground, litter and soil organic carbon provided by the results of reviewing 31 internal studies and IPCC reports. For projection of 2047 year deforestation under the baseline scenario, the Markov Chain was used. With the implementation of the base scenario, the CO2 emission was estimated at 43655472 tons by 2047. The conversion of forests to other LULC types by fire is an important source of other GHGs emissions such as CH4 and N2O. Forest fire information of Golestan province shows that since the year 2011 to 2018, 1511 fires have occurred. The results showed that fire would emitted 16083.51 tCO2e GHGs (CH4 and N2O) by the year 2047. The highest emission rates of CO2 equal to 17 million tons occurred in Marave-Tappeh township. The results shows the important role of Hyrcanian forests in reducing GHGs emission.